


The Change

by misshoneywell



Category: Hunger Games (2012), Hunger Games Series - All Media Types, Hunger Games Trilogy - Suzanne Collins
Genre: Dubious Consent, F/M, but what else do you expect from me, promptsinpanem, this got a little weird
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-08-28
Updated: 2012-08-28
Packaged: 2017-11-13 01:51:54
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,183
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/498123
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/misshoneywell/pseuds/misshoneywell
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"All things must change to something new, to something strange."</p><p>Katniss just wants Peeta back. Dark.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Change

She lost her mind while he was away.

_Away._

That’s how she has to think of it, as she and Finnick pace the halls and gnash their teeth and  _rage rage rage_.

She thinks of the hell he is going through as she mindlessly chews on the tasteless, ill-formed bread in the dining hall.

She clutches at her chest as she showers, and thinks about the beach; the last perfect moment together.

She lets the water beat down over her face until she can no longer breathe before finally, eventually, sucking in a gasping breath.

She wonders if Peeta is alive. She agonizes.

She is forced to imagine a thousand scenarios worse than the last as she lays awake at night, the pearl he gave her clenched in a fist. She makes a promise, a vow, to whatever higher power that is listening—

 _Bring him home, oh please. Please, bring him to me_.  _Whatever it takes._

\---------------------

She rushes toward his still form, an emaciated bruised boy, but he is alive and whole and  _Peeta._  He holds his arms out, and his fingers twitch as she nears. It must be the same anticipation she is feeling, because the strong hands move to cup her face in a gesture so very  _him_  that she could weep in the middle of the bright, sterile room.

His face holds some sort of suppressed emotion, and she wants to say  _me too, Peeta. Me too_.

“I missed you,” she chokes out, her eyes trained on his face as if he would disappear in front of her.

“I’m here,” he says.

\-----------------------

He’s confused more often than not.

The doctors say that his time in the Capitol did something to his brain.

He doesn’t like it when they say that, but she shrugs and messes with his hair when they whisper around him in his room, clucking and taking tests and refusing to release him until they understand things to their satisfaction. She sits and comforts him with little kisses to his jaw while they work, or presses soothing, rotating thumbs into his shoulder blades.

They rarely speak to one another, but it’s okay.

It’s still more than he says to Delly, or Johanna, when the visit.

He refuses to speak to Haymitch.

\--------------------------

Sometimes he looks at her with a glint in his eye, like he could eat her up, but doesn’t. Then he blinks and it’s gone, and he’s Peeta again, her Peeta, and she thanks whoever is above for bringing him back to her, even if sometimes his jaw clenches and his eyes grow dark whenever he thinks she’s not looking.

She doesn’t care.

\------------------------------

They release him from his sterile, observed captivity, and they are both among other people again for really the first time since he was rescued.

They eat their lunch with Johanna and Gale and Delly and others, but they might as well be alone. She fusses over his food and cuts it into pieces for him. Sometimes his hands still shake.

Gale looks at her in disbelief.

“He can’t cut his own food?” he asks with a raised eyebrow, the rest of the table looking on uncomfortably.

She shoots him a look.

Peeta watches as Gale studies his communicuff before abruptly excusing himself, and then turns to look at her thoughtfully.

\------------------------------------

He fucks her that night, that’s the only way to say it. He’s still thin, with fading bruises, but he looks more like himself as he moves above her, his face slackened and determined as he fills her.

He takes her to a place far away from Thirteen and she craves it, this freedom. She’s on the beach as he palms her breast, the lightning strikes at his questing, demanding fingers, and they are back home in the meadow when he shudders to an end.

But still he commands her thighs, and the empty ache between her legs, and she shrieks with the mockingjays, a thousand voices singing back to her when he finishes her with his fingers.

This isn’t Peeta.

“I need a communicuff,” he murmurs into her hair.

\------------------------------------------

He charms Beetee first, lingering for long periods of time with the older man, quiet and attentive and soaking up the tidbits of technical talk that goes completely over Katniss’ head.

She’s dozing on his shoulder when she hears him mention the communicuff.

“But don’t you think…get…more longevity…” Peeta is saying earnestly, and as her eyes fall shut she notes that it’s the most animated she’s heard him speak  since his rescue.

\---------------------------------------------

“Something is wrong with that kid,” Gale mutters as he pulls her aside one day after a particularly brutal training session with Squad 451.

“What do you mean, Gale?” she asks tiredly, her eyes already anxiously searching for him, and she relaxes marginally when she sees him running a fast lap in the distance.

“He’s silent as a ghost, and suddenly he’s everyone’s best friend? That’s strange, Catnip. Even—“

He appears at her elbow silently. She’s filled with relief.

“Let’s go,” he says into her ear, and moves her away as if Gale was never there at all.

She lets him.

\---------------------------------------------

Coin loves him.

It’s only been a short while, but she says he’s the most promising member of the Star Squad.

He disappears into her office for a few minutes, a half hour, every now and then.

She has never seen Coin smile before now.

Peeta has a communicuff now.

\----------------------------------------------

He takes her from behind, panting in her ear and winding his hand through her hair.

He feels close but very far away from her.

He flips her on her back and presses her into the bed as he comes.

“Things are changing,” he says as he lies beside her. He reaches for the communicuff.

The alarms go off.

\--------------------------------------------------

He tells her that her family is safe; her mother and Prim.

“They are valuable assets to the medical field, and the Capitol values usefulness,” he says as he leads her by a chain through the chaotic tunnels of District 13. “And you love them,” he says as an afterthought. “I kept them safe for you.”

She is silent.

“Not like my family,“ he says, waving a hand familiarly at a Capitol soldier that shoots a District 13 resident. “You killed them.”

She is silent.

\----------------------------------------

“Mr. Mellark, you’re a hero of Panem,” Snow smiles at the head of his table, his dinner guests breaking out into scattered applause and shouts of agreement.

“Thank you,” he says modestly.

“And is your new home to your liking?” the President asks in interest.

“We love it,” he says, looking at Katniss. “Don’t we?”

She is silent.

\----------------------------------

“I think I always knew,” she says as he ushers her through the hallway of their old Capitol apartment, now Peeta’s permanent home. Her home, now, too.

He nuzzles her hair as he slides his arms around her waist from behind, clasping her chained hands in his own.

“You knew,” he confirms, kissing her cheek.

\----------------------------------

She wakes up crying.

“It’s okay,” he says, sitting up in bed, his hand on her shoulder.

“I’m here,” he says. 


End file.
